Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1887-05-25
THE FIELD OF GETTYSBURG.

OF the refusal by the Battlefeld Memo
rial Association to permit the monument
to Gen. Pickett to be erected on the bat
tie ground of Gettysburg on the farthest
point reached in the Confederate charge
in that Hateful conflict, the New York
Herald says:
The brave Southerners who took part
III Pickett's brilliant charge at Gettysburg
have been looking forward to July with
high anticipations. They hoped to meet
their Northern opponents on that famous
and fateful day to rehearse the events
which were big with historic significance
and to recount to each other innumera-
BILE adventures and hairbreadth escapes.
They were also to take with them a
monument, commemorative of the splen-
did courage of their comrades, and to erect
it on the furthest point reached within the
Union lines. The plan is approved by the
Union forces which repulsed and drove
them back. There seems no harm in
marking the spot where the Northern for
ces were temporarily broken, and if a mon
ument to Southern courage stands close to
a monument to Northern pluck, what of
it? The brave men on both sides cross
ed their swords there, and the spot will
forever have a painful interest to every
American.
But the Gettysburg Battlefield Memo
rial Association says 0"No," politely yet
decidedly. They are willing to have the
monument built at Pickett's starting
point, but not within the lines of tho
Northern Army. They object, also, to the
inscription on the base of the monument,
two lines written in pencil by Gen. Lee,
and found in his army satchel after APP
pomattoX:
Glorious is his fate, and envied is his lot,
Who for his country fights and for it dies.
This strikes us as a very mean and small
business. So it will strike every soldier
who won honor on that field. The brave
man is always ready to give deserved
praise to his opponent. 1t was an awful
day that day of Pickett's charge, n
stern Southern stuff was met by stern
nifcent armies could meet in July, 1887,
thew would present arms to each other.
If the cause Of the North was victorious it
was not because the South lacked courage,
and we may we'll be grateful that after
twenty-five years the survivors, Northern
and Southern, shake hands as citizens of
a united country.
The dead of both sides may properly
be honored. The South should be invited
to build as many monuments as they
please, and on any spot to which their
dash and valor give them claim. Those
heroes lie side by side in %neighboring
graves, and if the monuments of North
and South touch each other they are SIM
ply typical of the two forces which, dur
ing the charge, were close enough to cross
bayonets.
The New York Sun, discussing the same
subject, says:
Why should any. Union soldier who
faced and beat back Pickett's division at
Gettysburg object to placing the monu-
ment concentrating this event at the
spot where the Confederates approached
nearest the Union lines? OF all places
that is the spot to put it. There was the
turning point of the war. There was the
high water mark, and there the magnifi-
cent bravery of the most splendid attacks
and repulses in the history Of war reach
ed it's climax. Here, then, both Union
and Confederate soldiers can meet on a